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Cycling Tasmania

Tasmania is gaining a reputation as one of the best places to ride your bicycle in Australia, if not the world.

The island-state boasts a diverse landscape, a temperate climate, oodles of quiet back-country roads and plenty of welcoming locals. In just a few days you can ride from golden farming valleys to high mountains and then down to the seaside. Not only that, but there are oodles of campsites, many of them free or very cheap.

The capital Hobart has been voted one of the world’s most photogenic cities and whether you’re in town or country, you’ll always find good food to fuel your ride. There are heaps of country pubs, restaurants, bakeries and farm shops everywhere you look.

Tasmania is also relatively easy to get to. You can roll your bike onto the Spirit of Tasmania ferry or hop one of the many low-cost flights to Hobart or Launceston from points across Australia.

Only one word of warning: watch out for the Tasmanian weather. Snow isn’t uncoming on the higher peaks, even in summer, and no tour of Tassie is complete without at least a bit of headwind and a rain shower. Pack accordingly!

Notes for some nice rides in Tasmania:

Cradle Mountain: Take a side trip from Gowrie Park to this landmark, unloaded!

Comments

Hi guys, I have just returned home after two weeks of touring in Tasmania. I followed your .pdf guide for a good part of the trip and found it to be very helpful (particularly descriptions of the roads). I managed to give my copy of the guide to a very nice UK tourer just starting his trip, toward the end of my journey, whom was grateful for it. If you wish to delete this post and/or move the information to another page or location on your site, I understand

I wish to make the following observations:

1. Wild camping is very difficult between Hobart and Bicheno. The land adjacent to the road is either fenced or rockface.

2. More emphasis should be put on caravan parks. At $10-$15 per night, which includes a kitchen, shower, toilets, beautiful location (usually next to a lake), and conversation with other travellers, it’s a bargain. I wild camped a few nights, but found that the water, cooking fuel and showers consumed at caravan parks (in addition to the comfort and companionship) more than justified the token cost.

3. I was disappointed with Andy’s Bakery. The staff were unhelpful and couldn’t be bothered with me. It cost $4 (no big deal) and apparently “usually costs $6 a night” with some discount apparently applied for me?! There was no free internet or anything set-up for tourers. It is just an empty paddock behind their bakery. At least a coin-operated shower ($2 for 5 mins) had been installed. It felt like wild camping!

4. If coming from Hobart airport, and heading north-east on the A3, tourers should not neglect to stock-up at their first town (Sorell) – particularly late in the afternoon. There is nowhere to find water or food until Orford. And the A3 heading north-east is more isolated and hilly than one would expect.

5. Don’t expect an easy time getting to St. Marys from Bicheno. Either road one takes will involve a lot of walking up a 15km incline through either Elephant Pass or St. Marys Pass.

6. The A1 from Hobart to Devonport isn’t ideal for touring but isn’t anywhere near as bad for touring as I thought. The road is of a very good quality and is not horrendously busy.

7. The weather can change very quickly. One minute it’s very hot, then cold. It can become dark and rain heavily within 15 minutes. Then the rain is miraculously gone and it’s a warm sunny day. The nights can be very cold — even in mid-to-late Spring.

8. My favourite three places from my trip: Deloraine, Bicheno & St Marys (for the scenery, but probably largely due to the people I met in these towns).

Matthew, this is fantastic information. Thank you! I’m hoping to update some of these PDF guides in the coming months, so I’ll definitely incorporate your tips as I do that. I’ll leave this comment here too, for people to read. Glad to hear you liked the caravan parks. We traditionally avoid them (not just in Tasmania but everywhere) because we find they tend to be overcrowded and expensive but that’s just our bias. Sounds like Andy’s bakery has changed a bit too! There used to be free wifi and a computer you could use in the bakery for free. Staff were always friendly. Maybe the management has changed?

We cycled a loop of Tasmania in February 2012. We found the sheer abundance and variety of wildlife to be the biggest highlight. Much quieter roads (and better drivers) than the rest of Australia. Our full Tasmania trip log and route can be found at:

About Us

We’re Friedel & Andrew: two Canadians who love travelling by bicycle. We’ve travelled through over 30 countries and cycled over 60,000km. Most of that distance was covered on a bike tour around the world from 2006-2009. Read More »

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